Potter's Electric News

IMPERIAL PARLIAMENT. HOUSE OF LORDS.—FMDAY. THE REFORM BILL. Their Lordships met at five o'clock, and all no- tices of motion having been withdrawn, th^tlouse went at once into Committee on the Kepfrsenta- tion of the People Bill. The discussion was opened by the Marquis of Salisbury, who moved to insert a clause a ter Clause 27,'with the ob- ject of enabling all duly registered voters for counties or boroughs to vote, under proper regu- 11 z, lations, by means of voting papers instead of attending in person. He s-asid that all the circum- stances connected with our elections and all our electoral returns seemed to point to the advantage of such a rule being established by law. The returns from the boroughs at the last general election showed that very little more than one- half the registered voters exercised their right of franchise, and his Lordship went on to show, from the returns of such large constituencies as London, Liverpool, Manchester, Marylebone,&c.. that the number of voters polled rarely exceeded one-half of their registered numbers, and, in some instances, fell very far short of even half. From many causes, such as business claims, indisposition, indifference to the exercise of the franchise, altogether thousands were kept away from the poll, and in some cases, and these were, unfortunately not rare, they were deterred from coming by the riots and disturbances at the polling-places, and which, as they all knew, had in Ireland often led to loss of life itself. It would be perfectly fa.<y to frame such restrictions and safeguards as would prevent the abuse of the voting papers, and he most earnestly hoped their Lordships' would give his clause a favourable consideration. Lord Derby said as far as the principle of voting papers went he would give the plan his most unqualified adhesion. He was not quite prepared to assent to all the details of the clause—in fact, he had not yet had time to consider them but as far as the principle went he most heartily ap- proved it, and was prepared to give it his most cordial support. The plan had bsen tried at the Universities, and had been found to work most advantageously. In counties its value would be great, not alone from the number of non-resident voters, but from the distances at which the polling places were situate and he was prepared to go even further than this, and to extend the principle to boroughs, where he felt sure that the use of voting papers would put an end to bribery, to intimidation, and, above to tho fear- ful expense of some borough and most county elections. Lord Do Grey could not for a moment agree either with the principle of the clause or with any of the arguments which had been used in its sup- port. The real lemedyforthd evils it was pro- posed to alleviate or remove was not voting papers, but an increase in the number of polling places. The clause, if carried, would be iraught with the most dangerous evils. The magistrates were brought as magistrates in direct contact with the machinery of ejection-the polling- -places would, in fact, be transferred to the magistrates' room; there would be an opening gi/en to an ex- tensive manufacture of faggot votes, while bribery could be carried on, not as nl;w, with doubt and uncertainty, but with the most perfect certainty of success, and with almost a positive immunity from detection. It seemed to him that from any point of view the objections against the mea- sure infinitely outweighed the little advantages the principle had under certain and peculiar cir- cumstances. Lord Cairns defended the clause, both as to its principle and as to the manner in which it could be carried out. The statement as to the manufacture of faggot votes TMS most fallacious. The manu/agr$«r'e of faggot votes had almost utterly ceased, and wCftid cease entirely when the county constituencies were increased, as they would be, under this Bill. It was a mere dogmatic assertion to say that bribery would be more general under' the system of voting papers than without them. The same might be said as to intimidation. Which was most likely to prevail ? Who was most likely to be intimidated—the voter who sent his paper by post, or the one who bad to run the gauntlet through a furious mob amid perhaps a shower of stones and rotten eggs? It was all very weH to say, multiply 'polling places,' but who was to bear the expense of putting up polling places opposite every man's door ? He thought that the clause could easily be introduced, and the details quickly resolved on, and he hoped their Lordships would consent to it. Lord Kimberly admitted at once that the clause had two great merits to recommend it. It did away with much of the expense of elections, and it would no doubt tend greatly to diminish riot and agitation. But the evils to which it opened the door quite ovsirbalanced these advantages. The most conspicuous among these were unques- tionably, in hIS opiniea*, those of bribery and in- timidation, and be believed that under the pro- posed clause they wouM become more and more unbearable. Lord De Ros gave a hrief, but amusing, de- scription of an Irish election, to show that intimi- dation had not ceased, but his short narrative was quite eclipsed by Lord Gloncurry's account of similar saturnalia such as he had witnessed there, and his description kept the House in continued laughter. The Duke of Cleveland said be should support the clause, for he believed it was-just in principle, and would work well in practice. At the same time he reserved to himself the most perfect free- dom of action in the course he would take when the details of the clause came on for discussion. Lord Carnarvon also gave his entire support to the clause, and met the assertion that it would lead to bribery with the strongest refutation. Bribery was as a rule, carried on in small constituencies, and only towards the very close of the poll, when it was seen how many votes were wanted to turn the scale. Voting papers, on the contrary, would very probably be made up a day or more in advance, when it would be impossible even for the keenest 'election agent to know how the voting z' t, would go. He should vote for the clause, and hoped the majority of their lordshIps, would vote for it too. Lord Granville said there were three fatal objec- tions to the clause-the chance of personation and the certainty of (both bribery and, inti Midation. -Ao- Now it was not a question of how far details might eventually be so altered as to meet these objections, it was what was before the House now. The Go- vernment might depend upon it that if this system I of voting papers once became law, it would not be I z-, long before they came to vote by ballot-a change which he believed those who sat on the Govern- j; ment benches would never wish to see adopted. After a few words from Lord Fortescue, which were most impatiently listened to, the House divided, when there appeared—• Contents 114 Non-contents 36 Majority -is The Marquis of Salisbury's clause was thersfore added to the Bill. A sort of conversation in almost whispers then took place across the table between the Marquis or Salisbury, Lord Granville, and the Lord Chan- cellor, not a word of which was audible, for the r buzz of conversation ail over the House was unusually high. Some misunderstanding as to what was heard or not heard evidently arose from this for a rather acrimonous discus. sion ensued, in which Lord Grey, Lord Derby j Lord Halifax, and the Lord Chancellor took part. Lord Grey complained bitterly of such a radical change being adopted in a Government Bill without the Government being prepared to state the details by which they were pre- pared to carry it out. This Lord Derby and the Lord Chancellor denied, and at length, after some debate, Lord Cairns explained that the details wou!d be brought up on the report of the Committee, when their Lordships would have a full opportunity of discussing and consi- dering them. After a few words from Lord De Grey, who also complninedof the unusual course taken by Her Majesty's Government, Lord Romilly moved that further discussion be adjourned till the clause and its details were in print; which was agreed to. Clauses up to 37 were then agreed to, the last with some verbal amendments of no impor- tance. On Clause 40 Lord Powis moved some technical amendments, with a view to assimilate the elections for the University of London with those of Oxford and Cambridge"; which, after some remarks, were agreed to. Clause 43 as attended, relative to the liverymen of London, by Lord Cairns, was also agreed to. On Clause 46 a long conversational discussion arose as to its wording, having especial reference to its definition of corruption. Eventually it was verbally amended and agreed to. Lord Stanhope then moved a clause to the effect that the Parliament should not terminate at the demise of the Crown, but should continue as long as it would have continued but for such demise, unless it should be sooner prorogued or dissolved by the Crown. Lord Derby would not throw any obstacle in the way of the clause if his noble friend thought fit to press it; but he thought, under all the circum- stances, it would be much more desirable to make it the subject of a separate Bill. Eventually the clause was agreed to without l' a division. On Clause 47 Lord Grey moved to insert in its place a clause to the effect that in future no nv.-mber of the House of Commons shall vacate Li3 seat on tlss acceptance of an office which does nnt now disqualify him from sitting in Parllarueut if re-elected. Lord Derby opposed the motion. It was one peculiarly for the House of Commons to consider, and, though the clause would no doubt be a great convenience to .Ministers, still its general tenour was such as he could not approve. After a few words from Lord Taunton, Lord Cairns strongly opposed the clause. If members of the Government were certain to he re- elected on taking office, there was no inconvenience in the present rale. If, on the other hand, they were uncertain about their re-election, it was the strongest argument of all why the rule should not be relaxed. The discussion was continued briefly by Lord Harrowby, Lord. Beaucaamp, and Lord Stanley of Aldurley, to uliom Lord Grey replied, when his Lord's motion nas negatived without a division. Lord GreV then moved after Clause 4S to insert a clause disfranchising from voting all persons employed in the CH"?] service, as they are now dis- franchised in the Revenue Department, but after a short discussion this clause also wag negatived. The other clauses up to 55 were then agreed to, as were also the schedules, and the Bill passed through Committee amid some cheering from both sides of the House. The other orders of the day were then disposed of, and their Lordships adjourned at 11 o'clock. ¡ MONDAY. Their LortMnps met at five o'clock. On the order of the day for considering the amendments on the representation of the People Bill, Earl Ru-ssell ceiled attention to the amendment which raised the lodger franchise from £ 10 to £ lS. He said the effect of the alteration would be in London to exclude the mass of the working classes from the franchise. 3a the provinces, persons of that class generally occupied houses, and would therefore come upon the register, but in London the same state circums'tar.ess did not prevail, and large numbers of skilled artisans occupied lodgings under £I{I' a year. He did .ot think that their lordships seriously contemplated to exclude these persons from the franchise, and be there proposed in the 4th clause to leave out and insert £10, Lord Derby was of opinion that the whole of the circumstances which had induced1 the House of Commons to place the lodger franchise at the yearly value of £10 which was equivalent to a rental of £19 per annum had not been clearly placed before their lordships. The practical difference between £ l0 and £ 35, especially when the clear yearly value was taken into consideration was so trifling,, that he thought their lordships would do wdl to recon- sider the subject, and to insist upon their amend- ment. Lord Hardinge observed that, much as he dis- liked the bill as a whole, he thought the tine had now arrived when they should endeavour to pass the bill without giving rise to angry discs ssions in 1 Z7' the House of Commons. He therefore hoped that their lordships would assent to Lord Russell's proposal. Lord Cairns remarked that he had been in igno- rance of the fact that there had already been a com- promise upon this question in the House of Com- mons. The question was first introduced by a private member, who proposed that the franchise should be a £ 10 rental, but after considerable discussion, a compromise was come to, raising the franchise from £10 rental to £H}"clenr yearly value, which meant a very different thing. If he bad been aware of these circumstances, he should not have moved his amendment, and he was now quite ready to concur in the proposition made by Lord Russell, After a few words from the Earl of Shaftesbury, the amendment of Lord Russell was agreed to. that the lodger franchise should be £10 instead of £15. Earl Granville called attention to the clause which enables students and graduates occupying zn I chambers in connection with the Universities of Oxford and Cambridge'to vote for members of the city of Oxford and the town of Cambridge. He asked Lord Derby to amend the bill by striking out the clause, and said the only effect of retain- ing it would be to create an ill feeling between the students of the Universities and the regular inha- bitants. He ntoved an amendment to that effect. Lord Camovs supported the amendment, and remarked that it would be just as reasonable to give the shopkeepers of Oxford and Cambridge a vote for the Universities as to give the students and graduates a vote in the city and borough election. Earl Powis defended the clause, and denied that it would produce any ill-feeling between the town- people and the Universities to exercise an undue influence in the election of borough members. The Earl of Derby said the number of under- g'aduates who could possibly come upon the regis- ter would be infinitesmal, and he did not think any ground had been laid down for excluding them when otherwise properly qualified from enjoying the franchise in the city and borough in which they resided. Lord Cranworth said the general principle was clear that the Universities should no interest in the town elections he opposed the clause because he saw in it the gprm of much unnecessary discontent and heartburning. Lord Granville's motion was negatived without a division. Lord Stratheden in the filth clause, which re- lates to the county franchise, moved an amendment, the effect of which was to raisfe the occupier fran- chise from a rateable value of £ 12 to a rental value of £ 20. The Duke of Marlborough opposed the amend- ment. He thought it would be most unwise for their lordships to disturb the arrangement which the House of Commons had con e to on the subject, and he was satisfied that the House of Commons would never assent to the amendment. The amendment was then negatived withoat a division. The Earl of Harrowby, in clause 17, moved an amendment, the effect of which was to combine the representation of the new borough of Chelsea with that of Westminster and Marylebone. He pro- prosed that the parishes of Chelsea, Kensington, Fulham, and Hammersmith should form part of the borough of Westminster, which in future should return three members, and that the second mem- ber proposed for Chelsea should be given to the borough of Marylebone, which in future should also return three members. He stated that his object in proposing this amendment was to extend the principle of the representation of minorities. The Earl of Derby opposed the amendment, which was negatived without a division. The Marquis of Salisbury then brought forward a series of clauses to carry out his clause for enabling tha electors to vote by means of voting papers. U 1"'n the first clause, which provides that the return- ing officer of every county should, on the occasion of every election, provide a bowk or books containing the number of voting papers for the use of the voters at such elections. E trl Russell said he entertained great objections to the S, stelu which would be introduced by the adoption of this principle he could not help regarding it as the introduction of the ballot in another form. The Earl of Derby eaid he was as strongly opposed cl to secret voting as any of their lordships, but pro- vision was intended to be made in this case that the returning officer should, during the hours of polling, publicly open all voting papers transmitted to hirn, and r^ad out the vote given for the candidate therein. The clause was then agreed to, as also were the re- maining clauses which specified the mode in which the voting papers shall be transmitted to the voter, and returned by him to the returning officer, and also tha offences in dealing with voting papers which are to ba dealt with as misdemeanours. Soine verbal amendments were agreed to. The Earl of Derby intimated he should ask their lord ah if s to read the bill a third time to-morrow. The Railway Company's Bill and the Railway Com- pany's '(Scotland) Bill were read a third ticn, and passed. Several other billa wet- advanced a stage, and their lordships adjourned at forty siaatts past eight (Aleck. • LIVING BY HIS WITS.—According to his history he had commenced life with £ 6000 a year and a com- mission in a crack cavalry regiment. 'But.' as ha used to say with the utmost gravity, • I made the running too early in the race, and could not 'stay* with the other horses. In six years I had sold every acre of land, every pound oi Consols, and had run on the wrong side of the post to the tune of £12,000. I sold out, and the price of my troop paid half my debts. I went through the court for about £ 6,000, and then set to work aa a private gentleman. I lived a little by betting a little by whist, a little by bii- liards, a little by a few fivers and tenners that I borrowed from friends and relations when I was very hard up. So long as I kept to what I under- stood, I got on well enough, but the devil tempted me to set up as a wine merchant, and in one year I lost-that is, I owed, for I had no losses in trade- £ 1,500, and I then went through the court a second time. How did I lose the money ? I'll tell you. I ssed to get, say, £300 or £ 400 worth of wine, giving three months' bills to the importer for what I bought. When my customers paid me I spent' the money, and did not meet my engagements. The wholesale wine merchants got angry one of them arrested me; and I had to go through the court. I was sent back, and had to remain six months in this hole. I then set up as a coal merchant, but made a mess of that; for I found that I paid higher for the coals I bought than I could retail them for, even if I had sold them by the sack out of a hand-cart. So I had to go through the court as a coal merchant. Since then I have been a promoter of companies, and that was the jolliest game by far. Why, I had at one time a matter of nearly £4,000 to my credit in one of the city banks. But the times all went bad, and I was sued right and left by those who had taken shares in the concerns I had promoted,' and so I was arrested, and here f am.,—Dickens's All the Year Round. COMFOUT FOR RAILWAY TRAVELLERS ON THE CON- TINENT.—The directors of the Baden railways have set a good example in the way of improvement. All the car- riages of every clcss are to be furnished with heating apparatus in winter; a great boon to the third-class passengers. Hitherto only first and second-class car- riages had been so provided. In France, first-class carriages are alone supplied with hot-water cylinders for the feet.. In England,-the first step has yet to be taken. in that direction. The printing establishment of the Presbyterian Mission at Sbanghae is a commodious building, with, presses and all the requisites for type-founding, stereotying or eleetrotying, printing and binding. The list of separate publications, including portions of the Bible, tracts, and occasional issues, printed the last year amount to 167 and the whole number of pages was 17,200,060.

as represented to have made in the presence ot rs owers and the prisoner's mother, and which Wtre to the effect that he was not the man who committed the crime, but she denied, in the most positive man- ner, ever having made such statements, and said that iPon the occasions referred to by the learned counsel rs Bowers was so unsenseless' drunk that she n.otl un(^erstan(l anything that was said to her. ihe witness admitted {kit when she was first ex- amined she did not tell the truth, but she said tha' 9rReason for doing so was that she was afraid of her psoand knowing that she had gone out on this ? £ ht to meet Brooker. She said, however, that she u ought about the matter afterwards, and she could not keep the secret any longer, and therefore she sPiitthe consequence was that her husband had Urned her out of doors, and she was without a home, and should not be able to get one again. In cross-examination the witness made use of the remarkable expression, I knew I should get into rouble by saying so, but I could not help it—that is the man (pointing to the prisoner) that did the deed.' -At the close of the case lor the prosecution Mr lIayman addressed the jury at considerable length On behalf of the prisoner, and he argued that in the ?.rs* place there was an utter abseace of motive for ls( committing the crime, and that the charge pes'9d entirely upon the evidence of the woman f 0i«n$, who he argued had concocted the story either -or the purpose of screening some other person in "Om she felt an interest, or out of some feeling-of revenge against the prisoner. He also said that he s*°u!d call witnesses to show that on the night of the ^Urder the prisoner was at the house of Mrs Bowers, 0 whom he was engaged to be married, from eight c'ne o'clock in the evening until three o'clock on following morning, and that consequently he ('I-?Uld not have committed the crime imputed to 11!11. Louise Smith, the married daughter cf Mrs owers, was then called, and she stated that the Prisoner came to their house about nine o'clock in e evening of the 23rd May, and that he remained J^era until nearly three o'clock on the following ^orning. She likewise stated that after the prisoner been examined by the magistrate on the first occa- ns and discharged, the woman Collins came to their y°Gse and told her mother that she would tell her a if she would swear never to 'split.' Her \ty-?!ler promised to do so, and she then said that "1 West was the first who had to do with the and that Henry Roots, the prisoner, said he ado the same, and took her into the wood ,she said that this occurred about eleven o'clock tl,.Izlg it on the 23rd. She said that her mother upon \\1'» told Collins that she was a liar, for the prisoner 0-a? ip her house the whole evening, from eight c'°ck til] three o'clock next morning. She then °Ceeded to swear that Collins made use of the q expressions that were put to her in cross- ^itiation and which she had de'nied. sn IQ cross-examination this witness said that when the Was first questioned by the police she stated that 'e prisoner came to their house on the 30th and °;,°n the 23rd of May. i's Bowers, the widow referred to in the evidence, c Vvhom the prisoner was about to be married, was as a witness for him, and she confirmed the ^•niony of her daughter as to the fact of thepri- mer having been at her house on the night of the OtiT*er 'rom eight o'clock in the evening until threu the following morning. 3^ie other witnesses were also called on behalf of Prisoner, who positively contradicted many of '^atements made by the woman Collins. Hayman having summed up the evidence for J? defence, and Mr P. J. Smith replied on the rjole case. W \us*,Ice Blackburn summed up at considerable ^af; ca^'n8 the attention of the jury to all the ^°^nts *ie case> particularly reminding evuien c'larSe rested almost entirely upon the woman Anne Collins, who swore to tos.fr8?en the act committed. He then proceeded ^at evidence of this description from such a Wo,6SS- 'c^€arly required considerable confirmation oaght to be acted upon, and it was for the J'ob" c°nsider whether there was sufficient cor- tk0^'011 this case to justify them in convicting '^prisoner. e Jury retired, but in about ten minutes they nu"0ed court and gave a verdict of$ot Uuty. Uuty. o